


Inferno

by PineWreaths



Series: Gravity Scars [3]
Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Angst, F/M, Gravity Scars AU, pinescest - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-02
Updated: 2015-10-02
Packaged: 2018-04-24 10:14:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 16,652
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4915663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PineWreaths/pseuds/PineWreaths
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The wildfires have reached Gravity Falls' borders, but they are not from any natural flames. This fire threatens to burn through the core of the Pines, splitting them as secrets are forever laid bare.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

She ran, the crackling of burning wood filling her ears above her own frantic breaths, her lungs filling with smoke that caused her to cough and retch. Her hands, her back, her legs, her head; all were burning, her eyes watering from soot and fear.All around her the forest was a searing strobe of red, yellow, orange, and awful white, casting harsh dancing shadows and making gnarled and blackened groves look like collections of frolicking demons.

She fell again, dashing her hand against hot rocks, her palms bleeding freely now. A crackling groan came from one set of burning cedars, the snapping of sap sounding like a gunshot. She spun around, searching the harsh light and dancing shadows for a shape she knew wasn’t there.

“Dipper? _Dipper?”_   she called, shouting to be heard above the raging winds around her.

The cedars cracked again, but this was different, like a boom of thunder rather than a crack of a rifle. She turned, smoke-reddenned eyes widening as she saw the tallest of the majestic trees shudder, and sway. She let out a strangled squeak of fear, turning to run as the ground rumbled in protest against the falling tree.

Without looking back, she knew there was no escape, between the jagged hot rocks to one side and the naked flames to another. She turned, raising her arms instinctively to shield herself, the perverse light of the burning tree blotting out all else as it filled her vision as she screamed one last time.

“ _DIPPER!”_

The weight of the tree crushed her, smothering her even as she flailed against the painfully-hot wood, the fire licking at her face as she struggled to-

“ _Mabel_ , sis, wake up!”

She slowed, her eyes jolting open. Dipper had crossed the bedroom of the Shack, hugging her tightly. One of her arms was caught in her sleepshirt, the other in the tangle of blankets, but her twin was holding her firmly, one hand cradling her head as she calmed.

“It’s all right, Mabes. It was just a nightmare.” His voice was calm, soothing, even, and she forced herself to take a shuddering breath, feeling her heartbeat slow and the sense of panic and rising bile force itself back down.

She gave him a smile, and hugged him back firmly before leaning back. Dipper swung to sit on the end of her bed, giving her a little worried smile as he said in a small voice “Another one about the fires, I’m guessing?”

Mabel wrinkled her nose and nodded, the smell of distant woodsmoke still painfully strong. Oregon, as well as this half of the country really, had been suffering under another dry spell and the recurring wildfires. While they had avoided the worst of the actual blazes, being far south to the infernos in their state’s northern neighbor, the smoke had still saturated south.

Her nightmares had begun at the start of the dry season as well, triggered no doubt despite her own injuries being from gas and burning plastic rather than plain wood.  _Still,_ she thought, feeling the puckered skin under her shirt back,  _Fire is fire, and even lighting the Grunkles’ birthday cake was uncomfortable. Makes sense then that smoke would set off the nightmares as well._

Dipper had been alongside her, worried the entire time after the first few nights, anxious she was suffering the same way he had years past from his bargain with a fae demon. Mabel had made…certain choices to help Dipper’s nightmares end, but now her brother was fussing over her like a mother hen, worried that she had just taken the nightmares for herself.

Even so, his worry was comforting, his care and the look of support so solid she felt she could lean on it, and when times had been bad she had done just that _. It’s really just us and the Grunks now,_ she thought wistfully.  _And on top of that, they’re getting up there in years, and eventually it’ll be just us._

She looked to Dipper, who chuckled and wiped a lone tear from her cheek with his mangled and abridged hand. She grabbed it as she laughed with him, muttering in mock annoyance “Stupid smoke,” the three fingers feeling as familiar as the original five as she gave him a brief squeeze. Looking into his face, now calm but still showing that now-permanent look of distant concern and worry, she couldn’t help but give him a broad smile back.

_I think ‘just us’ will be enough,_ she thought, leaning forward to give her twin a hug.

 

 

Miles distant, an empty stretch of forest lies pristine, quiet apart from the chirp of animals and the rustle of wind through the trees. The smoke is just a faint odor on the wind here, nowhere close to the permeating miasma in the Mystery Shack. A flock of crows, roosting in the branches of a stand of alders, start cawing and shifting about, the faintest hints of the blue morning streaking the night sky.

The crows descend, picking at various bits of insects and detritus on the forest floor, cawing occasionally as one finds an especially delicious beetle or part of a deceased squirrel. As the last of the murder lands, a chill breeze sweeps through the trees, chilling the birds as they try to take off and avoid the danger.

It is too late.

One of birds begin flapping and cawing frantically, thrashing as they try and escape; Their claws have frozen to the loam itself, little winking blue ice crystals melting and refreezing as the unnatural cold breeze fights the ambient summer air. One or two stay to check for a brief moment before resuming their perch in the trees, cawing anxiously.

Then, as one, the birds stop their movement, each deadly still and staring sightlessly at their frozen companion. The lone crow tilts their heads upwards, eyes rolling back and filling with milky white pus as they let out a moaning cry that has never been heard by bird nor beast in this forest before.

The forest is silent, deathly still, and even the breeze has stilled and left the leaves and needles of the forest mute.

The beak of the crow stay open after the call, and then cracks backwards, opening far past any natural point as bones creak in protest. The smell of heat and burning can be detected, and with a final shudder the bird is ripped apart from within, a creature made of flaming iron clawing its way out. It leaps from the remains of the crow, the dry pine needles under its bladed feet catching flame almost immediately, but it ignored the flames licking at them.

The creature resembles a centipede, hundreds of small legs in parallel singing and blackening wood and rock, while mandibles click together in a little spray of sparks as the many-eyed head turns around. FInally, it stops, angled in one direction as it takes off down the forest.

Its path is straight, and behind it the monster leaves a tracery of fire.

 

 

Wendy’s map had led the twins true, and Mabel sighed with relief upon finally spotting the tower. Dipper had made mention in passing about how boring being cooped up at the Shack was; The twins had been here for almost six months, but Dipper and the Grunkles both thought it wise to keep a low profile until a full year had cleared, in case the Child Protective Services was still looking for them.

A few state patrol had come by and questioned various townsfolk, and of course the Grunkles had nearly been interrogated, but in the end their stories held, and the investigation moved on. However, Grunkle Stan had still levied on them an order to stay at and mind the shop, out of the sight of customers, and it had been chafing Mabel for weeks, even with Candy and Greta visiting most weekends.

Thus, Wendy’s mention of the old fire lookout tower south of town came as a miracle balm to the cabin-fever the twins had. She’d marked it out on the back of one of the State Park maps Grunkle Stan kept in the gift shop, saying _“My cousin used to do duty over there, but now with all the satellite imagery and stuff it’s not really used anymore, and they pulled him off of the watch there about three years back.”_

Given that, Mabel had to say the tower was in great shape; She could still see the black reflection of the solar panels on the roof, and the windows all appeared to be intact and present. The dying light of sunset cast a brilliant bloody crimson glow on the stairs as they climbed upwards, as the sunlight filtered through the haze of the smoke from far-distant fires.

Dipper pulled open the door, dropping his backpack heavily inside and pulling out the little camp stove to set on a metal bench near one windowed wall. She had offered to carry the larger of the two packs, but her brother had insisted that she carry the smaller one with their food instead; She was annoyed at the brusque refusal, but now that they’d been hiking for several hours, she was glad that the itching soreness on the warped skin of her back wasn’t worse than it already was.

Mabel started at a slight electronic whine and crackle; Dipper had experimentally turned on the CB radio, and quickly clicked it back off. Mabel returned the sheepish grin he gave her, as he said with a shrug “Just wanted to test and see if it worked.”

She nodded solemnly, and replied “Yes, yes, good- We will need backups for when the mole people conquer the surface and capture all of our cellphone technology to enslave the surface with,” Dip’s laugh warming up the spartan little hut interior.

She cracked open a window and began a pot of water from their canteens on the boil, as Dipper pulled out their sleeping bags and pads. He rolled both out, stepping over to sit heavily in a chair next to his sister’s, as she turned off the heat. Filling both of their dehydrated meals with steaming water, she sat back, stretching like a cat as her brother mixed his food and began wolfing it down, only to choke and cough a second later, his open mouth full of food moaning out “‘He foo’ is ‘ill ‘’aw.”

She laughed at his thick words and his mournful look, and she punched him lightly in the shoulder. “Dummy, the water was boiling less than a minute ago; Of course it’s gonna be hot,” she said, giggling again at his awkward and embarrassed shrug.

Still, when she couldn’t resist taking a bite just another minute later, Dipper got to parrot her words back to her as she made little open-mouthed train noises as she tried to cool it down before permanent damage was done.

After eating, they pulled the chairs over to one window, peering through at the brilliantly-visible night sky. While their old home in Piedmont never had any appreciable view of the sky thanks to all the light pollution, even Gravity Falls was bright enough that the best view was eclipsed from the glow on the surface.

Here, though, no such barrier existed, and the siblings watched and pointed out the stars and constellations; The Big Dipper was immediately visible, and Mabel gasped in excitement as a shooting star flared briefly through the constellation just above her brother’s namesake. Finally, they sat back, enjoying the glow of the thousands of points of light of the Milky Way, spread out above them.

Watching the stars reminded her of an old saying she’d heard somewhere, and she turned to her brother. She smiled; His face was that glow of wonderment, usually reserved for the latest unnatural or supernatural find, but she loved just seeing him like this even for something as mundane as a fallen stump and nurse log, or a particularly nifty set of river rocks, or in this case, simply the stars themselves.

“Hey Dip,” she said quietly after a while, watching him turn, “With all the crazy stuff we’ve seen, the stuff you and Grunkle Ford have researched…Did any of it show what happens after we die?”

He turned to look at her, somewhat sharply, and his face had a haunted look she didn’t see very often. Too late she realized she’d said something wrong, but she tried to explain herself. “Like, we’ve seen ghosts and stuff, but does that happen to everyone? Or do most people _‘poof,’_  and just go away without being able to see loved ones and…and family, and stuff?”

He let out a long, held breath, and in a quiet voice he said “I…I really don’t know, Mabes. I…Sorry, I just don’t know.”

He got up, grabbing the back of the chair to bring with him inside, and Mabel began kicking herself mentally for even bringing it up when he stopped in the doorway and looked back at her.

“Was this about Mom and Dad?”

She looked down, nodding as she said “Y-yeah.” Her head turned, looking back up at the glimmering stars even as the wetness in her eyes gave them an extra shimmer. “I just…I just want to see them again, some day.”

Dipper’s expression had darkened, and her mind raced with his back to the last time they’d spoken with their parents, when the earthquake hit;  _That_  last communication had come at too high of a price in Dipper’s public opinion, and Mabel’s private one as well, but unlike her brother, Mabel was open to the idea of any price up to that enabling them to speak with their parents for just a while longer, and there had been several heated arguments to that effect over the intervening months.

His dour expression softened somewhat, and with a little smile towards her, he said “Me too, Mabes. Me too,” before turning to go inside and shutting the door behind him.

When Mabel came to bed almost an hour later, her brother was already fast asleep, snoring ferociously. She tucked herself into her sleeping bag, and only permitted herself a little crying that night before falling asleep.

 

 

Mabel awoke the next morning, the air still cold with the dawn despite the early clouds having been chased away. The smell of smoke was still there, stronger than ever, but at least she hadn’t had any nightmares. She turned with a smile to her brother’s sleeping bag:

It was flat, empty, and he was standing next to the old radio set.

Mabel was instantly alert; Dipper wasn’t standing, but rather more crouched, eyes scanning side to side. Mabel got to her feet, slowly and quietly, and with gradual creeping steps approached her brother. She grabbed her crossbow as she went from her backpack, gently  _snick_ ing a bolt into place.

She stopped next to Dipper, who by way of explanation looked pointedly off towards one side of the tower. There, a fire raged; It was narrow, and appeared to be slow burning, and that already had her on edge. However, what made her mouth go dry with fear was seeing that, while narrow, the burnt area formed a wedge shape, with the leading edge of the fire pointing directly to the watch tower they were in.

She turned, and her eyes fell on the CB radio set Dipper had been messing with the night before. Dipper was on his hands and knees, pulling at something under the table, but Mabel’s attention was glues on two facts:

The switch on the radio front was set unambiguously to _“on,”_  which she suspected was Dipper’s doing.

The second was the utter silence coming from the radio: Not the background they heard earlier yesterday, not distorted noise or static.

Dead, utter silence.

Dipper stood, his two-fingered grasp showing an insulated wire pinched between them. The end of it was warm to the touch, and melted completely through.

With a worried whisper, her brother looked around and said “ _I don’t think we’re the only ones here, Mabel.”_


	2. Chapter 2

Mabel stood stock-still, looking at her brother as they both listened. Straining, at first all that could be heard was the whistle of the wind through the slats of the watchtower walls, but after a moment she could hear something, a noise like someone impatiently drumming their fingers on a table repeatedly.

The sound faded and increased in passing moments, a ~~n~~ d soon she could feel a slight vibration in time with some of the thumping through her bare feet. Dipper had noticed too, judging from how he stared and swung his head, frantically trying to keep the source of the sound beneath their feet in front of him.

She watched as he experimentally tossed an empty can over to one end of the tower, and Mabel followed his gaze as the thumping moved distinctly away from them towards the can. There were a few breathless moments of silence, and then the thumping and movement continued to shift all around again.

Her eyes had caught sight of something somehow worse than invisible stalking monsters, though; A wisp of smoke, not new in this summer of heat and fire, but worryingly dense and close. It almost looked as if it might be coming from the base of the tower, which is when she gasped aloud as she saw it.

Dipper had swung to face her, but she ignored him as well as the sudden thumping moving to approximately beneath her feet. She raised a pointing finger, and her twin looked, letting out a quiet groan as he saw what was making her start to shake in fear:

A tongue of flame had crept up to the tip of the two trees near that corner of the watchtower, billowing grey smoke as it kissed at the railing of the tower’s balcony.

The shaking turned to full-on shoulder-hunching convulsions, as she could feel her throat tighten far beyond what the smoke would have induced yet. It was a panic attack, worse than anything she’d had outside of nightmares, and she fell to one knee, looking up at her horrified brother and ignoring his shaking head and frantically mouthed words as she said “Dipper, we have to  _go-”_

The floorboards beneath her erupted, shattering smoldering wood as a burning, metallic  _thing_ went past her shoulder. Part of its bulk slammed her arm, spinning her in place with the weight and causing her scream of terror to shift to a cry of pain; Her shoulder was hot, and the skin was already a bright sunburnt pink from the momentary contact.

Mabel spun, grabbing her injured arm as she faced the beast. It turned, the wood flooring crackling and igniting where it stood.  _Well, that explains the fire outside,_  the thought coming from the wry, rational part of her brain that wasn’t screaming in fear or panic.

She took a breath, and could feel a steely calmness descend, the panic being tamped down, acknowledged and filed away to be released in a melt-down later. For now, though, her actions were smooth and methodical, as she stepped over to the fallen backpack, to grab something they could use against the beast.

“Mabel,  _wait, no!”_

She had taken the step and grabbed the backpack, but Dipper’s voice made her turn back after she opened up the pack. She stopped rifling through it with her hand as she saw he wasn’t staring at her, but rather  _below_ her.

She’d been so busy and focused getting the backpack, Mabel hadn’t thought about what kind of damage the monster might have inflicted on the tower itself.

Her heart beat once, thunder in her ears, and the flooring under Mabel’s foot cracked and disappeared as the burnt-through support joist made its absence known.

She had just enough time to release the backpack and slap the splintered wood to try and get a grip, her hand slipping past and receiving a dozen splinters as payment for her desperate failed grab.

Mabel glanced down, time seeming to come to a crawl. The fire looked almost pretty now, the burning trees looking like they were wreathed in christmas tinsel and lights and shimmering as they strobed through the crisscrossing supports of the tower’s wooden legs.

The ground was entirely too close, and coming faster all the time. Mabel looked back, and reached her hand out, towards the variety of objects that had fallen from the backpack: Canned beans, a thermos of Mabel Juice, a box of matches, a flashlight with a Mystery Shack logo on the side, a change of both of their socks.

And what she was looking for, floating serenely in the middle.

Her hand stretched out, brushing past gently tumbling debris, to wrap around familiar, dusty steel, as she could hear her heartbeat rumble again in her ears. She forced her hand upwards, towards her distant brother and the creature that attacked them, and with a giddy smile, let out a triumphant yell.

 

_“GRAPPLING HOOK!”_

 

Unused gas canisters and pistons squealed in protest, but the squeezed trigger propelled the metal hook straight and true, punching through the floor of the watch tower, and Mabel held tight, ready for the inevitable stop one way or another.

It still felt like it nearly dislocated her arm when she did wrench to a stop, and swallowed as she looked down. The steely focus from earlier had mostly faded, and while she was mostly successful in swallowing the rising panic, seeing the sharp, hard rocks of the ground just a handful of feet away from her bare toes. She drew herself in close with a squeak as the remaining contents of the backpack hurtled past and smashed against the rocks, reminding her of just how close that had been to disaster.

She pressed the button on the side of the grappling hook, and felt herself drop as the top released; Already the cord was being rewound with the pulley squeaking, but she ignored it to cup one hand against her mouth.

_“Dipper?”_

There was ominous silence, with only the crackling of the burning trees audible. Mabel ran out from under the tower, back enough to the edge of the treeline that she could see the tower cabin a bit better. She cupped her hand, and called again.

_“DIPPER?!”_

By way of response, there was a thump, a crash, and the sound of shattering glass. Dipper had stumbled onto the balcony, but with horror Mabel saw his back was against the now-burning tower balcony where the trees had lit it aflame.

In front of him, the insectoid monster had emerged, burning a hole into the wood and coming out to face her brother. She could see the panic on his face, apparent even at this distance, and he stopped backing up as part of the balcony crumbled away in the face of the fire.

Mabel set her mouth in a firm line, and raised the grappling hook. Aiming carefully, she fired, and was rewarded when the metal tip struck true, punching into the side of the tower beneath the line of windows, directly between her brother and the fiery bug-beast.

He looked to her, looked a the grappling hook, and whipping off his hat, leapt onto the line. He wrapped around the rope, then flipped his hat over the cord and used it to support himself as he dangled and  slid down the rope towards her. Mabel had leaned back to brace herself, using her weight to keep the rope taut with one foot braced against a buried boulder

The rope abruptly went slack, and while she could see it was from the beast smashing the wall where the hook was embedded, more urgently and distressingly it meant that her brother was falling as well.

Luckily, Dipper was close enough to the trees that he was able to land heavily against some of the lower-lying branches, but she could still see her brother’s body ragdoll against the wood and needles. He landed, too far from the ground for Mabel’s liking, and let out a moan of pain as his hat fluttered to land upside-down daintily beside him.

She rushed over to him, helping him upright as he groaned again. He hissed in pain as she touched his left arm, but when she asked if it was broken, Dipper gritted his teeth and shook his head.

“Funnily enough, that would probably hurt  _less,”_  he said, carefully cradling his arm. “I think I dislocated it, and I don’t think we have time to fix it right now.” He looked meaningfully up at the fire watchtower, now completely in flames itself, but both twins could neither hear nor see the burning monster.

With a rumble, the tower creaked and shuddered as the burnt supports began to snap, and Mabel and her brother took a few steps back. Their caution was unneeded, though, as the tower fell almost entirely on top of itself, spilling some burning wood over to one side in a crescendo of crunching wood and smashing glass.

There was a rattling, crunching sound, and their heads snapped up as debris shifted and was flung aside; The burning insect was flailing, trapped under an enormous metal ‘U’ shaped bracket that had fallen  _perfectly_ and acted like a giant staple, affixing the creature to the dirt beneath.

Dipper, mouth open in fascination as his fear had apparently faded, began to take a step forward when it thrashed again, rattling the glowing-red metal, and her brother took a sharp step backwards.

“Uh, brobro,” she said with a nervous chuckle, “Maybe we head back to town and let them know about the fire and ask Ford about that beastie, eh?” Mabel pointed at the swath of fire the creature had left, which had now begun to spread to a slow-moving but respectably-sized conflagration. Dipper said nothing, staring at the impotently-flailing monster, before he snapped out of it, looking at her with an almost sad expression before nodding slowly.

She smiled, and grabbed his hat, smooshing it on his head with a chuckle before she stopped. His emergency use of the hat had left a thin, black carbon-scored rugburn crosswise through the blue tree, and seeing her look, he pulled it off and admired the change after an ineffectual rub with the thumb failed to restore the color beneath.

Nodding towards her sweater, he murmured “Looks like you got a souvenir too,” he said, and she turned to look and let out a gasping and moan of disappointment. Her favorite sweater, the shooting star, had the purple and teal stripes following the gold star in tatters. It had likely happened during her fall from the tower, she realized, but just seeing the intact red stripe somehow seemed incredibly disappointing.

He grinned, punching her lightly in the arm as he shot a look back towards the insectoid abomination one last time. “Cheer up sis,” he said lightheartedly, “It’s not like you can’t fix it up yourse-”

He petered off, seeing the tears in her eyes and sadly remembering  _where_ she’d gotten the sweater all those birthdays ago. He hugged her close, loosening his grip slightly at her wince of pain on her still-tender arm, and they began to walk back towards Gravity Falls, leaving the fire and the creature that caused it behind them.

 

 

It had been hours since they had left, with night well and truly encroaching, but still he spent all of the will he could muster on forcing the metal bracket down. Heat had distended and warped it, and he knew eventually the monster would be free again, but it didn’t matter. He knew every hour he spent was another hour they’d be safe, and he glanced around at the greyed-out surroundings of the desaturated forest before he put his shimmering blue hands on the bracket, forcing it back down again.

_“Ah. Aha. The mystery is solved.”_

He started, the grating and wet voice coming from seemingly everywhere at once, but as he glanced up, he recoiled in horror as the moon seemed to split into two, and a shadowy outline faded into existence out of the purple night, outlined in a cape of greasy feathers and looming like a perverted vulture over his small, shimmering form.

The boy stood, willing himself upright as he stared defiantly at the demon that hunched over him, observing him like he was a curious morsel to be toyed with or devoured at leisure. The face cocked at an angle that would have made human necks crack and snap, and without a mouth, the face spoke again.

_“‘Ullo, silent child.”_

He continued to stare, as the head swiveled back to approximately the center of the blackened body, and the damp voice oozed out again.

 _“Several times, I watched the naive and foolish children. Several times, they were saved, but not by my hands,”_ it said, flexing the impossibly-long claws tipping each leathery, hairy hand.

_“It now becomes clear: I have missed an opportunity, and that must be corrected.”_

The claws shrieked apart and opened, and the boy leapt backwards instinctively. The hands had opened up in a gesture of offering, and he looked up at the demon with a mixture of confusion and apprehension.

_“Silent child, you have been seeking, you have been wishing. But mostly, you have been silent.”_

The unnervingly-shaped face loomed close again, to the point where if he could have smelled anything anymore, he would have gagged.

_“Silent child, will you trade a mere tooth for your voice restored?”_

The boy’s mouth fell open.

_“Since you lack the capacity, a nod will suffice.”_

The words had barely finished echoing when the boy’s head bobbed furiously, eyes wide with excitement and the shimmer of tears. The demon leaned back, nodding almost to itself, but then spat the next words like a curse.

_“Child is trusting.”_

The claws on one hand shot forward, wisping through before coming back with a little spark of something blue. As he watched, his eyes widened as he saw the blue flare brilliantly, turning a bone-white and shining in the bleached sun, before emerging into an orifice to land on a pile of thousands of others with a little  _tink._

The creature then swooped forward, lifting off like a grotesque magpie to land in a rotten cloud of shadows next to the pinned shape of the burning centipede. With an almost leisurely wave of its hand, the metal bracket fell to pieces around the monster as if cut by welding torches, and the monster howled as it sprinted off in the direction the twins had left.

The boy spun, horrified by the beast’s release, and took a step forward to pursue it, to try and stop it again, when there was an awful sensation of weight and ice and fire rising like vomit in his chest.

 

Again, the enormous blackened shape turned towards the shimmering boy, whose hands had flown to his throat, and he let out a rough rasping cough, sucking in unneeded breath. Immediately following it were words, dry and cracking with disuse as he said “I want to make another bargain-”

He stopped as the stooped shape before him let out a chuckle that sounded like a waterlogged sack being slapped against a stone wall. It held up a single digit, the claw bending forward to tap the ghostly boy on the forehead once.

_“Child is forgetting. Child is limited with the cycle of the moon and sun. Child will make further bargains in a days time, and no sooner.”_

Then the creature seemed to fall forward, exploding into a puff of black moths who fled and disappeared into the various crevices and shadows of the forest around him, but the boy didn’t care. For the first time in years, and to the ears of no-one but himself, Tyrone laughed.


	3. Chapter 3

By the time they had made it back to the Shack, DIpper had started to become worried about his arm. He had tried to hide it, but Mabel could tell he was favoring it, wincing with every tree they clambered over or stream they jumped across as they made their way home.

Behind them, the smell of smoke occasionally trickled past, fueling her heartbeat into a raging drumbeat of panic despite the fire being well behind them. This patch of forest near Gravity Falls had been fairly well watered compared to the rest of the state, so the fire the monster had started was slow to spread. Still, Mabel and her brother had kept a pretty appreciable pace, and still the fire raged and followed.

She pushed that out of her mind, focusing instead on her brother. Dip had stopped again, acting as though the primary reason was to catch his breath, but in reality his hand white from tightness as it grabbed his other arm. It hung almost too loosely, the joint looking slightly off-center from the dislocation, and as he gingerly touched it, he let out a hiss of pain.

Mabel offered to try and help pop it back into place, but he gave her a strained smile and shake of his head.

”Neither of us has dislocated an elbow before; Heck, only you’ve dislocated anything, and that was your shoulder almost a decade ago,” he said by way of explanation, and a faint memory of a swing set and sitting and crying in a pile of bark chips came to mind. “We don’t know how to set an elbow to pop back in place right, and if we screw it up that would make it a lot worse.”

She tried to protest, telling him about the bone and anatomy class she’d taken last semester, but he shook his head again. “Sorry Mabes, but I can live long enough for us to get to town, and I’d rather not risk it.”

That had been almost an hour ago, and as they came into sight of the red lettering on the roof of the Shack, Mabel could hear Dipper’s sigh of relief. They stepped in through the back porch, Dipper cupping his good hand to his mouth as he called out “Grunkle Ford?”

Instead, he got a reply from the living room, as Grunkle Stan’s approaching voice yelled back “He’s out, gone to get some transistors or switches or something from  _PlugWorld Electronics_  downtown. Why, whatcha- _oh.”_

 

Stan had come around the edge of the doorway, but stopped when he saw Dipper’s arm. In two steps he was next to his nephew, gingerly holding her brother’s arm, and in a calming but firm tone he said “All right, Dip, I’m gonna pop it back on Three.  _One-”_

He concentrated and pushed, Dipper’s protest cutting off “I think we should wait for-” into a yelp of pain. Stan stepped back, and Dipper opened a watering eye, giving the arm an experimental wave as a grin of relief broke out on his face.

“Man, it’s-it’s great! Thanks Grunkle Stan; Where did you learn to set an elbow like that?”

Stan chuckled, a reminiscent look in his eyes as he said “Buddy I met in Ecuador through a mutual acquaintance, by the name of ‘Hat Trick’ Victor. Old Vic loved showing off his tricks; He had a fantastic card trick that we all swore was magical, and he could dislocate his elbow at will. The poor sonofagun never could figure out how to get it fit back in place, though; I was his partner during my, uh, ‘employment’ down there, and quickly learned how to help him set it in the dark, dead-quiet and surrounded by all manner of biting jungle insect life.”

Dipper’s frowned in confusion, and said “Wait, ‘Hat Trick?’ What was the third trick?”

Grunkle Stan sat up, staring straight ahead as he forcefully and quickly said “So glad you arm’s all better, Dip! What happened to cause something like that?”

Her brother just looked at Stan, disbelieving, but his grunkle met his stare and resolutely said nothing. Finally, Dipper threw up his hands in frustration, before explaining their encounter. He had barely gotten a few sentences in when he suddenly remembered.

“The fires! We need to call town and tell them about the fires!” Stan frowned, and in lieu of explaining their encounter with the burning bug monster, he said that they’d seen wildfires nearby. Stan nodded, briefly called the sheriff and relayed Dipper’s information, and sat back down.

Before Dipper could say anything, Stan leaned back, knocking back another sip of the beer he’d retrieved from the fridge before saying “So I assume the fire monster’s all been taken care of then?”

Mabel nodded enthusiastically, before slowing and saying “Wait, wha-how’d you know that?”

Stan pointed towards her sweater and Dipper’s hat. “Well, for one, you two look like you’ve been through hell, which means either you found something or something found you. I overheard your plans yesterday, and since fire watchtowers are fairly monster-free for the most part, I figured you got ambushed by something. You’ve both got scorch marks, there’s a wildfire right next to town but no lightning or fireworks for months, and Mabes, you’re sporting a nice shoulder-only tan.”

She touched her freshly-burnt injury, the light feeling still sending burning brands back along her neck and back to tingle in the long-cold puckered flesh there. Stan gave her a sad smile of support, realizing where her grimace came from, before turning back to the both of them and saying “So, elementary and all that.”

Dipper nodded, stopping and spinning as the door slammed open. A large brown paper bag held in front of his face, Ford came stumbling in under the weight, his voice giddy with excitement as he said “Stan? _STAN?_ You won’t believe this; They had a sale on plugs. And capacitors! It was a steal, so I filled up on both, but all the same it’s incredible that-”

He cut off as the laden bag was dropped on the hall table, and he turned to see Dip and Mabel, looking like they’d been through several small wars and a fierce border skirmish in just the last 24 hours.

“Oh my god, what happened?” he said, rushing over to fuss over both the twins. Mabel shrugged and turned to Dipper, unsure of how to describe what it was they saw before besides “It was on fire.” Here, her brother’s great memory for details helped him describe the burning iron centipede that attacked them, and Ford listened with rapt attention. As Dipper finished, he began nodding.

“Yes, that does sound remarkably like a creature I’d heard about, called a Recruiter.” He looked up, deep in thought and wiggling his finger like he was reading off of a mental checklist as he spoke. “Apparently they were made at some point by an unnamed madman, with instructional runes burnt into them. They would permanently fuse themselves to a victim, and then they’d be compelled to act however the instructions dictated.”

Mabel shuddered; She didn’t like the sound of Ford’s mention of fusing, and her mind was dancing with all kinds of unpleasant probabilities involving burning, molten metal and her own scarred skin. From behind her, Grunkle Stan said “Mind control? Eh, count me out,” and began shuffling towards his bedroom.

Dipper had shrugged at Ford’s history lesson, and now said “But I didn’t see any runes or anything; There were some scratches and a few decorative things, but nothing I’d say looked like that.”

Grunkle Ford leaned back, sucking a breath through his teeth. “That’s what I was afraid of.”

He leaned forward, steepling his hands as he looked over his glasses at the twins. “Those ones were those who never were given instructions. Instead, they just try and make the bearer think like them; Insectoid, hateful to life and utterly alien.”

He paused, adjusting the edge of his glasses before solemnly saying “The three I’d heard of who had been attacked by these during my travels, all were overwhelmed by the alien presence overriding their senses, and killed themselves within a few weeks of the fusing.”

Mabel let out a low, sad whistle, and Dipper shuddered with likely the same revulsion and relief as Mabel herself felt at the monster, and their avoidance of its clutches.

However, after shuddering, Mabel could tell Dipper was standing extremely still, his attention focused on something as he stared distantly. Grunkle Ford had failed to notice, instead whipping out a notepad and jostling some information on it with a chewed ballpoint pen, but Mabel nudged her twin with an elbow.

“Brobro, what is it?” she asked, her voice quiet and concerned.

Dipper started slightly, looking at her with confusion and a sliver of hope in his eyes as he said “Oh, I…I thought I might have heard something.”

She cocked her head quizzically, and he just shrugged, saying with a chuckle “IT was probably nothing.”

Still, he told her long afterwards, at that instant, he thought he could hear distant, faint laughter.

 

 

The faint smell of smoke had grown throughout the night, and now, as the twins lay sleeping, it was as strong as if a bonfire was lit in the Shack’s parking lot. The smell of the distant smoke made the smoke coming from the side of the Shack itself almost unnoticed. Moving slowly and with measured steps, the Recruiter was moving in a circle on the wall of the bedroom, burning slowly but surely through the wood.

With a slight crackle, it broke through, and leaned down to grab the loose wood in its mandibles to drop on the dewy grass below, rather than let it clatter onto the floor. Finally, with sufficient pieces removed, it climbed into the bedroom. The fire this time was muted, withdrawn like a cat’s claws, emerging only from the joints on occasion rather than wholly wreathing of fire it had before; The predator was hunting now, rather than just attempting to intimidate and conquer with brute force like it had attempted at the watchtower earlier.

Reaching the top of Mabel’s bed, the monster climbed across the thick comforter, skittering over to directly above her arm. Carefully, it climbed over the length of her right arm, stopping, and almost lovingly, the first set of claws tucked the hot metal under her wrist, the ends of the claw fusing together with a metal weld that glowed bright for a moment before dimming.

Mabel Pines woke up with the shock of pain, and began to scream in revulsion, pain, but mostly terror.


	4. Chapter 4

“Do you ever wonder if we should have warned them?”

Mabel’s voice cut through the darkness, through the sound of lazy crickets and the quiet rustle of wind through pine needles. She and Dipper were sitting against a fallen log, gazing up into the vast panorama of bejeweled stars. He had his arm around her, holding her tight against the cold after she had started shivering earlier, but he could feel a chill creeping over him as well when she spoke.

He sighed, and his mind raced back to the calculations he had done months ago, cross-referencing news reports of the speed and ferocity of the tsunami and flooding after the earthquake, and checking those against distances he had carefully measured on a map. His voice tight, he shook his head a little and said “I…I looked, Mabes. We were on that call for three and a half minutes, bef-before…And with the speed the wave hit, and how far inland it went…Even in a car, i-it wouldn’t have made a difference.”

He could feel her tense, but after a long moment she nodded, her head tilting back to match his as she watched the stars above. He rubbed her shoulder, feeling the tracery of the old burns and scarred skin; The motion made the stumps of his fingers itched, and he momentarily relieved them with his thumb.

She turned to look at him, and he faced her, giving her a little grin as her anxious face fell. Taking a deep breath, she said “Dipper, I-I _AAAAHHH!”_

He recoiled, stumbling back as Mabel thrashed, her mouth open far, too far, as the scream became a shrieking sound, partially muffled as bubbling tar comes hissing and steaming out of her mouth. Dipper hindbrain kicked him in fear, recognizing the signs on a subconscious level even as he reached out a hand towards his sobbing and choking sister.

Her fingertips barely brushed his when she slumped back, her spine abruptly rigid and arched to its fullest extent. The pool of burning-hot tar had congealed around her like a heavy blanket, and Dipper choked out a sob as her mouth slammed shut, the sound of her teeth audibly cracking together making him wince.

Her shoulders turned towards him, as the tar bubbled and flowed across her, forming long quills that covered her shoulders and hung downwards, slowly expanding to long, slim feathers. He gagged, his conscious brain finally catching up to the alarms his eye for detail had been screaming at him.

Mabel’s head finally rolled forward, slumping to hunch over before craning upright, rigid and at a slight angle. Her eyes had rolled into the back of her head, and as Dipper watched, the red veined tracery faded, the bright white of her eyes becoming the color of soured milk as the still, somehow continued to watch him.

Feeling the bile rise in his throat, he choked out a single word, which was soon echoed by omnipresent, slimy chuckling.

_“Pact.”_

 

Mabel thrashed, and screaming as she wrenched her arm to the side. It felt like someone had placed her arm against a car window that had been baking in the sun, and as she ducked as best she could out of the way, the remaining arms of the centipede missed their mark on the upper part of her arm, and instead gouged and smoldered into her purple pillow.

She took a deep breath, and let out another scream, this one more out of anger and utter terror than simple pain, as she recognized the beast attacking her from yesterday.

Dipper shot upright with a  _“Stop,_  no, don’t-,” blinking the sleep out of his eyes as he turned frantically to see what was the matter. He let out a yell, starting to draw back when he saw it had grabbed his sister.

Dipper sprang forward, grabbing a textbook from his nightstand, and swinging at the metallic insect. He connected with a dull  _thock,_  but to his surprise the book didn’t immediately catch fire, encouraging him to hit it again.

The second blow resulted in a screech, and one of the claws punched through the cover and first dozen pages of the book, wrenching it out of Dip’s hands to fling into a corner of the attic. The upper part of the serpentine body swung, catching him under his raised arms and knocking him backwards.

His eyes widened in pain at the heat of the contact; It hadn’t burned him, but Dipper realized if it hurt _him_  that much…

He shot a look to Mabel, as he got up onto one knee, and he could see her writhing. Her eyes were wide, unfocused even as she thrashed at the monster with her free hand ineffectually. She had twisted her body almost ninety degrees, and now her head was hanging over the edge of the bed towards Dipper, as she hit the unyielding body with a closed fist. In response, the creature reared up, clawed legs opening wide as it arched the iron body like a cornered snake.

Without thinking, Dipper lunged forward, arm extended as he tried to shield his sister from the impending blow. He managed to interpose his arm just in time, and the beast struck

 

 

The uppermost set of claws on the burning abomination closed around Dipper’s wrist, and with a feeling like his wrist was being blowtorched, the edges of the claws glowed a brilliant cherry-red and fused together. Dipper’s mind was filled with the pain of his wrist, when suddenly-

_-burning, oh god, like the fire earlier, so much burning, burning make it stop-_

He jerked his head up, pulling at the iron creature that had bound his wrist. It had begun jerking spasmodically, the motions and claws now abruptly weak and aimless, and the heat now a dull unpleasant warmth instead of feeling like it was threatening a burn at any moment.

He forced himself to take a deep breath and got to his feet as his mind raced.  _Okay, so I have a second; Time to collect my bearings, so I can make sure we don’t get any more trapped-_

_-trapped my hand; Can’t get it free, but I think Dipper managed to stun it somehow-_

Dipper looked up from the wiggling beast, feeling a thought that was distinctly not his own echoing in his mind. Mabel leaned her head up to look at her standing brother, and then they connected.

 

 

He felt like his stomach had been sent into freefall, to float at once a few feet above the floor and also directly on the bed. His head was pounding, when it wasn’t moments before, but he could feel blood had rushed to it as he leaned it back over the bed, while at the same time he was just tilting it down to look down at his sister, his eyes looking up at her brother.

Dipper could feel his eyes widening, both sets, and a sound like drumbeats sounded in his ears. He realized he was hyperventilating, and he could feel anxiety pressing on him like a smothering blanket. A part of him wondered if this was the worst his anxiety had ever been, and then his memories exploded in front of him, the washed-out and distant-sounding memory of how he felt after Mabel had gently told him she wasn’t sure she felt the same way about him.

He had been dreading that moment ever since she had gotten quiet, months after he had declared his affections and won her the music box trophy.  Quiet Mabel was worried Mabel, and on some level he had been dreading that she’d come to her senses first, and realize that reciprocating affections, becoming a couple, would never work.

It still hadn’t made hearing her say those words any easier, while shaking her head and breaking his heart.

The memory of that moment made his heart pound, his knees weak as one of him almost fell to the floor. At the time he felt like he was going to black out, like life was meaningless, and while it had been fleeting, the echo of that alone was enough to send him staggering.

He had started to catch his breath when the memory hit again, but he felt like he was pulled by a tether. This time his memories were different, altered, and-

His mind spun as he started to realize what was going on, as he looked at his own face from what could only have been Mabel’s eyes.

Feelings of unbalance, a tightness of breath, and the echo of nausea accompanied this, distinct from Dipper’s own feelings of despair a moment ago. Still, above all of that, there were fresher, stronger feelings riding along with this, those of-Dipper felt his heart surge, the beating now raging a tempo of its own in his ears as he realized what it was:

Regret.

_Longing._

And undercutting it all, a deeper affection than Dipper had ever thought possible, warming him to his core.

He felt giddy, his own heart soaring, and then the hope in his own chest surged stronger than he’d have imagined it possible to feel, so painful it almost felt like-

He gasped, the sound coming from both mouths as he realized he could feel part of him, of his mind, was not his. Instead, it was a surging and withdrawn presence all at once, strong and frail, warmer than he had imagined but cautious as it reached out to him.

_Dipper?_

He choked back a laugh of amazement, and concentrated on a single, unforgettably-familiar name.

_Mabel?_

In response, he felt like a firework of excitement had sprung in his mind, a string of happy giddiness and relief that he didn’t remember starting ran through him, and he responded in kind.

_Dip, oh Dip, this is incredi-_

He could feel his attention turn, sluggishly, upwards as the attic door slammed open. Grunkle Ford and Grunkle Stan were there, Stan armed with a pair of brass knuckles while Ford had his laser pistol drawn. He yelled something, the voice coming from far away and too slow for him to make out what he was saying, but Dipper instinctively held up his hands and flinched away.

His reactions were slow, but shared between both of the bodies he felt himself, no, us inhabiting, and the two twins pulled away from the aiming Grunkle, the slowly twitching metal insect brought up between them to stretch taught as the pistol fired a single brilliant flare of light.

 

 

Dipper felt an ugly surge of lightheadedness, as if someone was tickling inside his skull, right above his ears, but abruptly he was in his own body, the floating sensation now grounded in his own familiar perceptions and feelings. The tickling in his skull caused a rise of abrupt, stomach-wrenching nausea, and he coughed, swallowing frantically to keep his bile down.

Mabel had no such luck, and instead coughed, turning and pulling over the wastebasket frantically before puking into the plastic container. She groaned, and went to wipe her mouth with her shirt sleeve.

Time had resumed its normal pace, and suddenly the Grunkles were there, Ford examining the metal centipede and the now-smoking hole through the center of it. The iron body still tethered the twins, but at least now it wasn’t moving of its own accord, and instead hung limply.

Meanwhile, Grunkle Stan had helped Mabel sit up, giving her a grin and passing her a half-full bottle of water sitting near a picnic basket on the floor. She sipped it slowly as he instructed, cautioning her to avoid gulping it, and leaned over to look at the dead, metal bug.

“So, uh, what the hell was that, Sixer?” He rapped a brass knuckle against the body, resulting in a hollow metal ringing, and gently gave a tentative tug with his hands at the fused claws around Mabel’s wrist.

Ford poked it with a gloved finger, and saying “It’s definitely a Recruiter, but…” His voice trailed off as he held up the limp middle of the body, looking to the twins’ wrists. “I’ve never seen one bind more than a single victim before.”

Dipper shrugged helplessly, saying “I was trying to protect Mabel, and I think it accidentally grabbed me and melted the claws together like that.” Ford turned to Dipper, his voice calm but with an underlying tenor of urgency.

“Dipper, I need you to remember: Did you encounter any kind of memory transfer or anything? _Anything_ at all? This is unparalleled, and I have theories about what it might mean if-”

He swallowed, but then Dip shook his head fervently. “No, nothing. Just made me lightheaded, and then pukey when you killed it.”

Grunkle Ford nodded, visibly disappointed and rubbing his chin as he looked up. Mabel had glanced up from her drink, shooting him a look that said:

_Dipper, what the hell are you doing, not telling them?_

His eyes shot open as he tensed, suddenly grateful that Stan was off refilling the water bottle in the bathroom and Ford was looking out the window.

_Uh, M-Mabel? That you I’m hearing?_

He looked over, and his sister was wide-eyed staring back. As he looked, she slowly nodded her head, and glanced down to the bug between their wrists.

_O-kay; Apparently the horrible fiery centipede monster that will haunt my nightmares is, what, telepathic?_

Dipper shrugged, nodding as he thought _I guess so._  He had a momentary pang of curiosity, and concentrated, imagining a picture of Mabel flying a kite, before thinking to her  _Did you see that?_

She cocked her head.  _See what?_

He nodded, slowly. Mabel gave him a look of annoyance, and he explained  _I think we can only basically talk to each-other. No pictures or anything-_

His thought was cut off by Grunkle Ford suddenly shouting from the window “Stan?  _Stanley?_  Get the kids, and get to the car; We need to go now!”

Dipper’s head shot up as he heard Stan poke his head in, before nodding to his twin brother and running down the stairs and into the kitchen. Meanwhile, Dipper had gotten to his feet, stepping over to the window as Mabel followed close behind him.

A high-pitched squeaking noise could be heard as he approached the window, and Dipper looked around as he tried to identify the source. He realized what it was as he saw the boughs of the trees swaying violently.

_It’s the wind gauge, and it’s going nuts. Since when did we have a gale blowing through? It was supposed to be calm all this week and next according to the weather reports._

_Beats me Dip. See anything out the window?_

Dipper started a bit, shooting Mabel a look as she gave him a faint smile and an apologetic shrug. He had forgotten he now might be sharing his train of thought with an audience. He just shook his head with a little smile in return, and turned to peek past Ford to the forest beyond.

The distant trees were illuminated, outlined black against flickering reds and oranges dancing lights.

His breath caught in his throat, and he tried in vain to hide his reaction from his sister.

“Dipper, what’s wrong? What is it?” she said aloud, her voice pitching high enough for him to notice her sudden stress, and Dipper swallowed. He knew she didn’t want him to sugarcoat things for her, not at a time like this, so he spoke the truth in a strangled, quiet voice.

“The forest…The forest is burning, and the wind is blowing this way.”


	5. Chapter 5

The twins jerked back from the door as a distant thud shook the window. Grunkle Ford held a hand out protectively in front of them, squinting as he looked to see where the tree had fallen.

“We need to move,” he said, pausing only slightly as a tinge of wistfulness entered his voice. “The Shack isn’t safe, not any more.”

He turned, striding past the twins, his long coat flaring as his mechanical leg hissed in protest, and then the twins were alone in the attic. Sharing a single look, they both began frantically stuffing their backpacks with whatever necessities and keepsakes they could.

Mabel had just finished perching her music box on top of the pile, when Stan called up to them. “Kids, the car is ready. Let’s  _go!_ ” Dipper zipped up his backpack, hiding the picture frame of him and his sister and he went to pull it on-

The dead metal Recruiter was still between their arms, its weight not unbearable but for the time being forcing Dipper and his sister to chuck their backpacks over a single shoulder before heading downstairs.

Stan was there at the door, carrying a large duffle bag. Dipper could see a dollar bill peeking through a rip in the side, and Ford soon joined them, only a small leather side-satchel slung over his shoulders.

They ran out to the car, clambering inside. Ford lagged behind a moment, his hand resting on the wood of the Shack, before closing the door, engaging the deadbolt, and running to get to the car. Stan gave him an incredulous look, saying in a voice dripping with annoyance “Glad you could join us.”

Behind them, the fire was licking over the bushes, threatening the edge of the woods in the clearing surrounding the Shack. Stan grunted, tearing his gaze away from where they all had been staring, and jamming his foot on the gas. The  _Stanley Mobile_  tore off, with the heat from the one side of the road notable even inside the car.

 

Dipper turned slightly, noticing as Ford was muttering under his breath.  _“C’mon, c’mon, work, work you stupid enchantment, work already.”_

With a hum Dipper could feel in his bones, the Shack suddenly flared a brilliant green, traceries and sigils covering every surface, shifting slightly even as he watched. Grunkle Ford pumped his fist, letting out a  _“Yes!”_  as Dip could hear a rising, whining rumble.

There was a noise like a cymbal in a garbage disposal, and the traceries exploded into black stone. Within seconds, the entire Shack had become jagged black rock, although even from here Dipper could read the sign on top and make out the weathervane. Both appeared to be made of the same material, and even the totem pole had turned the color of soot, the faint green lines visible across the surface and seeming to perfectly match the uneven texture of the stone.

Mabel, while still staring in wide-eyed fear, said “Grunkle Ford, if you protected it, why didn’t we stay there?”

Ford looked, frowning with worry as he saw that she wasn’t even looking at him when she spoke. He put a hand on her shoulder, giving it a reassuring squeeze, before saying “I’m sorry Mabel, but that ward is dangerously indiscriminate; It turns everything inside to stone, both inorganic and living matter, and the transformation would have killed us.”

The car jerked, and for a second Dipper thought Grunkle Stan was avoiding a burning bush or fallen bough, but instead he screeched back “ _What?_  Sixer, have I been sitting in a magical _deathtrap_ this entire time? All that was standing between me and a stony death being some idiot playing with matches or something?”

Ford rolled his eyes, and patronizingly said to his brother “Of course not. It needs a trigger to be primed before it will react and change the warded area.”

Stan huffed but then nodded, and concentrated on the road again, but Ford’s expression had Dipper asking cautiously “So, um, what was the trigger?”

Ford looked at him and said nothing, but Dipper suddenly noticed how Ford was cradling his hand, the glove covering the injury but with splashes of blood visible on his sleeve.

 

Suddenly Stan swore, and the car jerked to the side, almost going off the road as the younger twins screamed and Ford yelled. They came to a screeching halt, heads jerking forward, and Dipper could see in front of them was a burning tree, the snapping of the pine sap hissing and igniting merrily as it laid across the road.

They all stared, Mabel shuddering and whimpering, and Ford letting out a whispered “How?…” as they caught sight of the base of the tree that blocked their way towards the town.

It had exploded, the base surrounded by finger-sized pieces of unburnt wood. Dipper looked closer, squinting as the wood looked.. _.shiny?_  As he watched, the shine on one piece disappeared, and the of wood began to smolder where it was touching the naked flame. Looking to the head of the splintered stump, Dipper could see a ball of ice the size of a softball, dwindling rapidly.

Ford continued to squint and look at the stump through the window. Then he stiffened, and Dipper looked again. He could see the trunk of the tree, very few sections unburnt at this point, but one area all too clear.

There were claw marks on the bark, deeper than Dipper had seen before from any animal, but nevertheless combining with the traces of ice to provide an explanation as to how the wood could just shatter like that.

It also set Dipper on edge. _Should have known Pact was behind all this-_

_Pact? What? NO!_

Mabel had started sobbing as Dipper’s thoughts streamed to her, and he quickly scooted over on the seat to hug her close. “Shh, shh, it’s all right Mabel.”  _Sorry for scaring you. He’s not here, but I think he was the one who dropped the tree on the road._

She nodded, slowly, sniffling, as Stan wheeled the car around, heading instead for the interstate. “Should have enough gas to make Corvallis,” he muttered.

Their Grunkle gunned the engine, and they passed the dirt turnoff to the Shack, ignoring it for now as they approached the narrow stretch between the looming, overhanging dual cliffs that framed the road on either side, the old mining bridge visible for a moment as it was silhouetted against the moon.

 

Ford was deep in thought, muttering to himself as Dipper eavesdropped.  _“But the last time I saw something like that…Wait, could it?…No, a conduit would have been needed, even for a small breach…Unless…”_

He turned to look at the younger twins, concern and a dash of curiosity in his expression as his gaze swept over them. Dipper averted his eyes, but then noticed when Ford suddenly caught sight of something overhead.

He was staring at the bridge, which was nearly overhead.

“Stan! Stanley,  _stop the car!”_

Grunkle Stan grunted, rolling his eyes in the rearview mirror as Ford yelled  _“NOW,_  Stanley!”

“Fine, fine, no need to burn out my hearing aid,” his brother muttered, and he hit the brakes, sending the car into a skid as it slid slightly to the side.

They rumbled to a halt, and Ford bolted out of the door, looking up at the bridge, which appeared to be directly overhead. He then began looking around in the grass to one side of the road, the weeds and rocks illuminated in the car’s headlights as , frantically muttering  _“C'mon, c'mon, please be-”_

Mabel and her brother had gotten out as well, and she must have spotted a glimmer in the grass behind the car as she wandered over, dragging Dipper along behind her.

She crouched, pushing a tuft of grass aside to reveal a gleaming silver railroad spike, a ring of pulsing yellow runes just below the top written in an odd, flowing script that seemed to be out of focus when Dipper looked directly at it.

It appeared to be sunk only an inch or so into the soft dirt, but when Dipper gave it a tentative poke with a bit of stick, it resisted toppling as solidly as if it was sunk three feet into the soil.

As Dipper poked it, Mabel cupped her hand and called “Hey Grunkle Ford! Was this what you were looking for?” Dipper looked around, and could see another of the spikes, parallel to the road like this one and stuck in near a stump in the treeline.

Their Grunkle came running, and he fell to his knees in front of the innocuous spike in the grass, choking out “Oh…oh thank god it’s still here” between gasps of air as he caught his breath.

Head still down as he scrutinized it, he stuck out a hand, waving Dipper and Mabel behind him. “Kids, stay back. This protective ward from the spikes I laid only covers the town and surrounding forest; Any farther, and we’re in deep…in deep…oh,  _crap.”_ Ford had looked up, seeing the faint lights of Gravity falls ahead of him.

On the other side of the marker spikes.

 

 

He stumbled back in shock, and then waved to the rest of the family. “Get over here, now! Quick; Run! _Run!”_  As he yelled, he ran towards them, scooping Mabel up into his arms. Dipper stumbled to his feet and followed behind, but he caught his foot on a tuft of dirt and wincing as he felt his ankle twist in a way it probably shouldn’t.

He started to fall, feeling that horrible sense of weightlessness, when the back of his parka was grabbed by Grunkle Stan. He hoisted him up, slipping an arm under Dipper’s arms for support, and helped him as Dip hobbled along with his temporary but acutely fresh injury.

They had made it to the invisible ward, Ford gently dropping Mabel through before following after her himself. Dipper felt his feet land, and he turned to grin at Grunkle Ford, when he felt the feeling of vertigo again as he looked at his Grunkle:

 

 

Stanley was on the other side of the barrier’s border, which was now shimmering a faint glittery yellow, like a gauze curtain stretched over glass.

 

 

Stan tried punching the barrier, but his blow reflected off uselessly. Dipper, suddenly yelling in desperation, tried to break through on his side, but the edge of the shimmering wall was just as unyielding. Mabel was alongside him, trying to use the dead hanging Recruiter as a bludgeon by slamming it out against the dome, nothing resulting from it other than a ringing note from the hollow metal body slung between the twin’s wrist.

Still, it was better than using their bare fists, and Dipper helped his sister with the second blow, no damage appearing yet in the warded shield but another clear note ringing out from the impact.

Ford looked up, yelling to the twins with his face suddenly a rictus of horror. “No, stop! The ringing-”

Dipper, a tidbit of knowledge he’d read ages ago tickling his mind as he tried to stop his sister, but Mabel’s blow connected before she slumped to her knees in exhaustion and frustration, letting out scream of frustration.

The final impact rang out, and even Grunkle Stan, tears wetting his cheeks on the other side of the shimmering veil, turned as the forest went abruptly, deadly silent.

Behind the twins, Grunkle Ford began quietly reciting, his voice quavering with nervousness and worry.

_“When thrice the bell is rung,”_

There was a rumble of thunder, the ground shaking as a huge swath of trees all around them and outside the barrier crashed to the ground, their trunks shattered with ice and all of them falling directly away from where the four of them stood on the road.

Ford continued, now with Dipper chiming in as the sleeping memory was awakened, a feeling of nausea in his throat as implications and possibilities began to crystallize in his minds. 

 _“In shadow and ice he comes,”_  

Like a pair of gunshots, the two trees that had been near the border of the barrier shattered as well, toppling to land behind the twins and Ford, the tips of the pine boughs swatting their backs and shoulders as the impacts nearly knocked them to their feet.

 _“Twice a bargain he’ll keep, in trade for teeth.”_  

Mabel stood, her hand pressing against the barrier opposite of her Grunkle’s, and Dipper fell silent; The book he’d found with the saying had been ripped, and the last line had been missing.

Ford began to speak, but choked off in disbelief and a dawning horror as Stanley spoke the final line:

_“But the third is hope undone.”_

 

 

There was a godawful cracking noise as his head was flung back, his body going rigid as his limbs bent at angles they were never meant to go, and his black tuxedo seemed to melt and spread across his form, covering his form like a misshapen cloak as the black, thick grease flowed over all of their Grunkle’s form.

All that is except for his face. His eyes stared past them, unblinking, before slowly rolling back in his head, distending and swelling to press outwards towards them as they rotted from a healthy red-veined eye, to a sac of luminous green-grey pus.

Silence abruptly reigned, and it took Dipper a moment to realize he had been hearing a combination of his screams, those of his sister, and those of Grunkle Stan.  Ford was standing there, mouth agape, breathlessly repeating  _“No, Stanley, please tell me you didn’t no, tell me you didn’t, Stanley, please-”_

The head then swiveled upside down, the snapping noises of the vertebrae almost an afterthought, and without speaking, a voice rumbled like the thunder of an angered god, seemingly coming from every shadow in the darkness around them.

 

_“Children. Foolish, naive, desperate, and…”_

Stanley’s head thrust towards the barrier like a snake, stopping an inch from the golden glow as it faced Grunkle Ford. He jumped back from his twin, eyes wet as he looked, searching for a sign of his sibling inside the monstrosity.

Stanley’s unspeaking mouth broke into a wordless grin, the teeth black with pitch as Pact said with a triumphant air  _“…and arrogant.”_

It leaned backwards, drawing itself upwards. The fallen needles from the hundreds of downed trees flowed like water towards Stanley’s form, flowing to form a sheening, spined bulk as the hunched shape grew before slumping over to stare at them all. Then it spoke, with a sound like mold growing in the bottom of a well.

 

 

_“‘Ullo again, children.”_


	6. Chapter 6

Dipper surged to the front, interposing himself in front of his Grunkle Ford and his sister.

“What do you want with Grunkle Stan, Pact?” he said, thrusting a finger towards his Grunkle’s possessed face. The milky eyes regarded him passively for a moment, the fixed grin still present even as the voice echoed out of nothingness all around them.

_“The desperate child has already served my needs. I will now speak with the arrogant child.”_

Stanford cleared his throat, and as Dipper looked back he could see naked fear in his eyes. He looked to Dipper and his sister as they watched their Grunkle uncertainly:

His fear was still present, even as he looked at his niece and nephew.

Ford’s voice was muted and filled with a note of defeat Dipper had never heard from him as he whispered “Why…why does-does this ‘Pact’ know you two? W-what did you do?”

Dipper couldn’t meet his gaze, turning aside as he stared towards the ground. Mabel did the same, her shoulders hunched and her face drawn, and Grunkle Ford strode past them to stare defiantly at the twisted face of his brother.

“Speak, demon. Tell me what you want and let Lee go.”

The awful laugh bubbled around them again, and Stanley shuddered. The needles that had formed a shaggy shawl seemed to powder into ash, and he fell forward into a heap, one hand banging against the glowing gold barrier as his unconscious form fell.

“Stanley!” Ford shouted, trying to grab his brother through the impermeable barrier. His fingers impacted the golden glow, and he let out a growl of frustration. Stanley’s suit was stained with growing patches of red. He was breathing, but it was shallow, and Dipper could tell from the angle that his arm was broken quite severely in addition to the numerous cuts and bruises across his form.

Dipper tried not to think about the sounds of cracking bone he’d heard earlier, and instead looked to the swirling form behind his Grunkle Stan.

Behind Stanley, the ash had blown backwards, and formed a swirling vortex, drawing inwards and growing smaller as the shape in the enormous cloud grew more distinct. The clouds blew outwards, as the black cocoon that had formed erupted into an enormous pair of sooty wings, the outline of the feathers visible for a brief moment before a flow of tarry oil followed and slicked them into two sets of talons.

The talons framed the torso of the creature like perverse antlers, and the remaining form was similar to the feather-caped greasy hunched mass Dipper and Mabel had seen before, albeit now towering nearly the height of a tree. While the eyes had reformed, the painfully-familiar and unsettling milky-white luminous orbs, the demon’s head now sported a large beak set flush into the face like that of an owl.

Dipper felt his stomach heave as Pact  _grinned,_ and he realized that the thousands of white specks making up the fangs were made of the teeth he had seen in the demon’s pouch.

The grin remained as the voice continued, the mouth unmoving as the voice emanated forth from the huge form. Dipper could hear the words vibrate in his ear, humming and whining with a pitch that made him cough and groan to try and clear it from his head.

_“Arrogant child, you made a fortress of this settlement.”_

Pact’s clawed hands swept wide, gesturing towards the group as it continued.

_“Yet you have missed that you trusted three traitors who have traded me seven teeth for my services.”_

_No._

 

The thought of despair was not Dippers, but his sister’s. He looked over to her, seeing the disbelief and fear in her eyes as they shimmered with tears silently running down her face. Dipper could feel his own throat tight and burning, drawing his attention away from the blazing pain in his shoulder from Pact’s brand.

He had wanted to disbelieve it, hope for another possibility to the ease and totality that Pact had controlled their Grunkle, but now he felt hope dwindling.  _The books never said anything about what happened after the third bargain. I had thought they just were killed, but…but I think Pact just uses them as a fucking puppet._

_No._

Again, the thought was from Mabel, but when he looked back to her from where he was staring at Stan, her eyes were narrowed in determination, her cheeks still shining from the drying tears.

_We don’t let that…thing…take Stan, take our Grunkle! There must be some way, somehow we can save him from Pact. We…_

_…We can’t give up on him,_ she finished, the strength and conviction suddenly crumbling and Dipper feeling the same hesitation and worry that flooded through his sister.

He looked upwards as Grunkle Ford spoke, his voice filled with confusion and disbelief as he threw up his hands.

“But…if you had Stan, why didn’t you break the barrier already? It’s obviously still active,” he said as he went to rap a knuckle against the gold shimmer.

Pact chortled again, the sound making the hair on the back of Dipper’s neck stand to attention.

_“Arrogant child, your barrier is already broken, your shield in pieces you cannot see.”_

Dipper and his sister cried out, as Pact swooped forward, a gust of wind blasting them all through the portal effortlessly to land in a heap near Grunkle Stan. Ford waved a six-fingered hand through the shimmering veil without any effort and groaned as he realized Pact had been playing them for fools. 

Then his eyes widened with remembrance and he spun to check on Stan. Lacing his fingers through his brothers, Ford gave a choked sigh of relief as Stan coughed, squinting open his eyes and taking a shuddering breath.

Tears of relief and fury in his eyes, Grunkle Ford looked at the gloating demon, who hovered over them and seemed to be drinking in their misery with that rictus grin.

 _“How?_  Every node would need to be undamaged and bound to its location or the barrier would have fallen immediately!”

Pact’s head ducked low to Ford, causing all four of the Pines to try and inch away from the immense, disgusting presence.

_“Arrogant child, you think a thing must be locked in rock and earth, when blood and meat will suffice.”_

Dipper felt himself lifted by an invisible force, Pact’s taloned hands upright and parallel to him as he was lifted a few feet off the ground. As Mabel was yanked to her feet, standing on tip-toes as the dead Recruiter tethered her to her brother, Dipper could feel the shoulder of his opposite arm ignite, more pain than he had ever felt since-

_Since the day Pact Marked me._

 

Unbidden, memories flashed through Dipper’s mind, of the door, the burning ice, of Pact’s horrible form in the cave of wondrous eggs.

But Dipper realized, gritting his teeth with anger, as he realized Pact was taunting him with the vision, revealing to him the truth behind yet more clouded and altered memories.

Pact had been watching the children from the moment they entered the cavern, milk-white eyes following them as they stepped into his realm, over the gleaming silver spike embedded in the floor.

He had grabbed Dipper, but his grip had held the spike, and he forced it deep into the top of his chest before sealing it shut with the scars.

And as Dipper’s entranced form left the cavern with his sister, undamaged by Pact’s illusory traps and ethereal attacks, he could see that with the blood on his claws, Pact was drawing a set of twisted sigils on the floor of the cavern in Dipper’s blood, where the spike had been removed.

 

Dipper screamed aloud, Mabel echoing his cry as a fraction of the pain was unwillingly passed along the Recruiter’s connection, and the meat of Dipper’s shoulder opened like a perverse flower along the scar lines. The gleaming silver spike slid out, the scrape against bone causing Dipper to retch and cough with pain.

Then it was aloft, hovering above Dipper’s stained and ripped parka and shining wetly in the night air. He panted, trying to catch his breath, and in front of him Pact’s huge face emitted the unmoving laugh again.

_“Foolish and arrogant children. Your fortress is-”_

_BANG!_

 

A single gunshot rang out, and made a musical _ting_  as it hit the rune-engraved spike.

Below them, Grunkle Stan was on his back, a smoking snub pistol in his hand as he panted and grinned.

 

The spike began to fall, tumbling as Pact’s concentration was momentarily broken, and Dipper could feel himself falling as well. But Mabel had been ready for this, as she swung and outstretched her hand towards the silver metal spike.

 

Dipper felt his breath catch as her fingers tightened around the spike, and Pact’s howl engulfed their minds.

 

An enormous black claw swiped through the space both twins had been occupying, and while it missed both twins, it sliced cleanly through the remains of the Recruiter, cutting it messily in half. Dipper felt like he’d been hit with a blast of cold air as he felt his connection to his sister evaporate, but as he landed he curled into a roll, getting to his feet at the same time as his sister.

The twins ran to their Grunkles, Mabel getting under one of Stan’s shoulders for support while Ford lifted the other, and together they ran for the veil. Mabel let out a scream, and started to falter as a burning tree slammed down in their path, just a dozen feet in front of them and the unburnt boughs nearly whipping their faces.

Ford yelled “Keep running, no matter what!” but Mabel was stuck, eyes clenched shut as she shuddered in fear. Dipper reached for her, grabbing her shoulder and squeezing it. Her eyes snapped open, and he said loud enough for her to hear “No more nightmares, Mabes.”

Her face was confused, before Dipper summoned the nerve, steeled his heart, and said “I love you.” Then he shoved her, hard, causing her to stumble, screaming, into the burning tree.

-And then _through_  it, as another of Pact’s illusions was revealed, and Dipper’s sisters and two Grunkles half-ran, half-fell through it and then the next few steps over the barrier. Mabel was looking at him, wide-eyed and on her knees as he ran towards them all, her expression unreadable at this distance as Grunkle Ford scrambled to grab something on the ground.

Dipper felt his heart pounding as he ran, the heat of the false tree tickling him, but as his foot almost his the edge of the barrier, he seemed to slow, his entire vision going black except for the frozen face of his sister.

 

 

Unable to move, he felt a gentle claw placed on his shoulder, in an almost paternal manner as Pact spoke, sounding like he was right behind his ear.

_“Foolish worm. You are not the victors, only survivors of a single day. For your singular insolence and trespasses, you will witness when I consume her flesh, strip by strip. Now be gone.”_

Then time resumed, Dipper passed through the veil, and with a triumphant yell, Ford brought a large misshapen rock down on top of the spike, driving it into the dirt by the side of the road, and burying it to the head in a single blow.

The barrier flared, and congealed in a loud metallic snap. The veil was no more, instead replaced by what looked like thick, amber glass. Pact’s form impacted against the barrier, exploding outwards into a howling black sandstorm as Ford slowly and defiantly got to his feet, and shouted.

 

“And _stay_  out!”


	7. Epilogue

The dawn broke through the clouds, the smoke having cleared as a light rain began. Dipper smiled, loving the feel of it on his face as he began to breath easy again. Behind them the dome had disappeared, becoming invisible again as Pact fled to parts unknown, but Dipper didn’t care, and almost felt like skipping as they walked back towards town along the highway.

 

He was free.

 

For the first time since that damned day in the mineshaft, his shoulder didn’t ache. Well, it  _did_ hurt like crazy from the open cuts and slices that Ford had helped bandage together with a gauze patch in his coat. It stung, the cloth quickly staining red, but the underlying pain was gone, and Dipper could feel his heart lighten with each step. He’d gotten so used to the constant, throbbing pain that its absence beat any temporary suffering the new open cuts provided.

He stopped, looking away from in front of him, where Grunkle Ford had a supporting arm under Grunkle Stan, and Dip looked to his side. Mabel was looking away from him, her shoulders tense, her gait stiff.

“Mabes, what’s-”

She flinched at his voice, before turning to face him. Already Dipper could feel the internal lightness dissipate, as the recollection of what he’d done to Mabel just a few minutes ago came crashing back into his mind.

“You…you pushed me, even though…even though I was-”

He hung his head, swallowing and screwing his eyes shut as he said tensely “Oh god Mabel, I’m sorry.” Still looking at the ground, he could feel his worries becoming concrete, of his sister hating him for forcing her into the burning tree. It was a false projection, one of Pact’s tricks, but her screams and frozen inability to recognize it for what it was had been indication enough of how real it was to her.

“I-I knew it was an illusion, and I…I could tell you weren’t-” His voice trailed off, and he fought against the despair to whisper “I-I-I’m so sorry for-”

He nearly jumped in shock as he felt her hand grab his, squeezing it and rubbing her thumb along the nubs of scarred knuckles in that way she did when they were alone and scared. He looked up, and saw her face; Not drawn in anger or hatred or despair, but a deep, worried compassion he wasn’t expecting.

“Dipper, what about  _you?”_  She said, giving his hand a squeeze as her other arm gestured back to where Pact had disappeared.

He looked at her, and with a sudden shame brought on by her gaze, he muttered _“Didn’t matter.”_  He looked up, giving her a little grim smile. “Most important thing was to keep you safe.”

Her voice broke as she took a breath between her teeth, trying to keep her voice even as she said his name.

“Dip…” She gave him a grin, her eyes glistening as she brought his hand up to feel along the twisting scars along her shoulder, and neck.

“I…I would walk through fire again, for you, if it meant you’d be safe.”

She brought her hand up to his cheek as they both stopped, her head leaning forward to place her forehead against his birthmark. Dipper could feel tears running down his cheeks as his shoulder shook, his mind awash with a mixture of cold shame at doing what he did, risking his own life when he knew how Mabel would feel, while his feeling of love for her burned even hotter than before.

She hadn’t spoken, or even acknowledged what he’d said to her before the shove, and part of him both fervently wished she hadn’t registered it, while the rest of him had hoped beyond hope that she would say something in return. She hadn’t, but Dipper was so glad that his sister wasn’t hurt, didn’t hate him for what he…for what he did to her, that he didn’t care.

 _After all of that, she…she forgives me,_  he thought, his breath catching as he sobbed quietly, Mabel silently holding his hand and rubbing a thumb along his jawbone as she smiled, her eyes glittering and widening for a moment as she looked into his.

 _I-I can’t believe she would want to even look at me after this; Fuck, what did I ever do to deserve a sister, a twin, a….a soulmate like her?_ He smiled at her through his tears, his toothy grin being met by her light flowery laughter at seeing her brother happy again.

_Screw the consequences, screw what’s right, what’s proper, any of that shit. I love her._

_I love you too, brobro._

 

He jerked his head back, and Mabel laughed again, smiling and nodding empathetically to answer his questioning look of surprise. Dipper’s eyes went wide, an incredulous smile breaking across his face as he realized what she had mentally said, and he pulled her into a kiss, his lips mashing hers with excitement, enthusiasm overcoming discretion as his eyes closed. Mabel squeaked out a giggle, and then let out an appreciative hum, moving her arms around to his back to hug him tighter as she met his enthusiasm in stride.

Dipper broke the kiss, leaning back with a feeling of joy he didn’t know if he’d ever felt before, and he lifted his sister up by the waist, spinning her around giggling before letting her back down into a kiss, loving the taste of her lips, her flowery smell cutting through the pine and smoke, and the feeling of her closeness and heartbeat above all else.

Dipper looked down, seeing that the broken half of the Recruiter still lay in shambles from his wrist, but even then he could feel a faint vestige of the connection they’d had before, and he realized the metal of the claws fused around their wrists were touching. Seeing his gaze, Mabel giggled.

_So, um, the metal is what’s doing the telepathy thing?_

She nodded, and he could hear her thoughts in reply.  _I think so; See, when I move it away-_

Suddenly her voice faded, but as the metal clinked back when she moved her arm back to it’s position, interlacing her fingers through his, he heard it return.

 _-back. So as long as we’re close, secret thoughts won’t be a problem._ She winked at Dipper, and he grinned, giving her hand a squeeze. He ducked in for another kiss, before straightening; He wanted to make sure the Grunkles, who by now were far ahead of them, didn’t see the thoroughly inappropriate kisses.

Still, as they walked, Dipper held Mabel’s hand, feeling a sense of peace and complete joy that his sister projected as well that they hadn’t felt for years, and they spoke, sang, and laughed together as they walked.

All without saying a word.

 

 

Grunkle Ford looked back to Stan, helping his brother up after looking back at the twins. “So, uh, Lee. Looks like Dipper and Mabel were, uh-”

“Yeah, yeah. Just let them have this. Not like it makes a difference or anything.” His dejected tone caused Ford to frown, turning to look at his brother as he helped him walk.

“Stanley, what-” He cut off, as his brother gave him a look, one filled with defeat, sorrow, and regret. His brother looked down, but Ford’s brow furrowed as he asked something that had been nagging at the back of his mind.

“Lee, that gun…”

Stanley looked up, sighing as his brother completed the question he hoped he wouldn’t have asked.

“…How many bullets did it have?”

 

Stanley wouldn’t meet his eye, and just looked down. After a few seconds of walking in silence, he said what Stanford was afraid of hearing.

“Just one.”

 

The brothers walked in silence for a little while longer, the rain making a gentle hiss against the trees and road as it fell through the dappled sunlight. After a while, Ford cleared his throat.

“If you ever bring that gun along again, Lee-”

Stanley cut him off with a wave of his hand. “Fine, fine, I  _promise_  I won’t-”

“-Bring two bullets.”

 

There was a moment of stunned silence, as Stanley looked at his brother. Ford smiled at him, a soft, sad smile despite his scars from his extra-dimensional experiences.

“Sixer, what-what are you saying?” Stanley said, hurt and confusion competing in his voice.

He looked down, his shoulders drooping as he let out a humorless, disbelieving laugh. “I’m just dead weight, a damn puppet for that damn demon. I…I screwed up, put you all in danger, and _quite literally_ threw my life away. What the hell would make you want to do something like that for me-”

“You’re still the loving lug of a brother you’ve always been, Stanley. After all, you made the bargains with…with Pact, for my sake, for the kids’ sake.”

Stanley’s jaw dropped and he flushed with embarrassment. Stanford turned to him, an edge of a peeved expression on his face. “Lee, I made sure, made  _damn sure_  that the portal couldn’t be rebuilt. There were too many people, too many possible ways it could be abused, used as a weapon or a doorway to greater evils getting into our world. So, I left out crucial information, without which you wouldn’t have anything more than an expensive and purely decorative light generator.”

He lowered his voice from the near shout it had risen to, lowering his waving hand likewise. “The only way I know of to get that information to start the portal again like you did would have been with a demonic bargain, and I left  _my,_  uh, ‘informant,’ back on the other side of that damnable rift.”

He let out a sigh, helping Stanley step over a scraggly root. When he spoke again, it was quiet, regretful.

“I-I also know human anatomy. Not a lot, not enough to be a surgeon or anything, but I know that the injuries I sustained coming through the portal…”

He looked his brother dead in the eye, his own narrowing as he spoke with finality.

“My wounds were fatal, Lee. I  _should_  have died of blood loss less than a few hours after emerging from the portal.”

 

They walked with silence for a while longer, the distant smoke from the fires around Gravity Falls now faded along with the flames that made them. Quietly, Stanley sighed, and said “Thanks, Sixer. I-I’m sorry, but thank you.”

Stanford stopped, turning to face his brother before nodding. “I’ve made a lot of mistakes as well, Lee. A lot of broken, broken promises. Would you be able to forgive me for that?”

Stanley let out a snort, rolling his eyes and stomping over to give his brother a reassuring punch in the shoulder, getting one in return that caused him to wince with his injuries after a brief delay. Stanley started chuckling and said ”Ha! Anytime, Sixer. Anytime.”

Stanford held up a six-fingered fist, and with an unsure grin said “Fistbump?” Seeing his brother’s nonplussed expression, he rubbed his neck, saying awkwardly “It was something I saw Dipper and Mabel doing, and it seemed, I don’t know, appropriate.”

Stanley regarded the fist like a coiled snake, and cautiously brought up his own. The two brothers tried to connect, but Stanford was aiming two high, and Stanley was too forceful, resulting in more of a drive-by sideswipe rather than a connected impact.

Stanley scowled, but then broke into a grin and said slyly “Let’s do it the old-fashioned way instead, eh Sixer?” He grabbed Stanford’s hand, pumping it into the air as he began to shout into the woods “Pines, Pines Pines!”, with Stanford joining the chanting a moment later.

 

 

The two sets of twins arrived at the Mystery Shack, to find that all around them most of the trees were gone, fallen or burnt where they stood. The area was warm, but even as they stood there the falling rain persisted, cooling them and hissing out the last few areas of stubborn embers.

The Shack itself was still a solid stone edifice, the green runes faint but still visible. Stanford took a few steps forward, pressing a hand to the stone and chanting something guttural, and abruptly the stone retreated like frost under a blowtorch.

A few seconds later, the untouched Mystery Shack was back to its former self, surrounded by the black, ashen remains of the forest.

Dipper and Mabel sat on the porch as their Grunkles went inside. Ford attended to Stan with some kind of parallel-dimension medical kit, but a few minutes later he came out on the porch with the twins, carrying a hacksaw and a pair of metal shears. Sitting down and concentrating, he began carefully removing the cumbersome Recruiter from the twins’ wrists.

It went quickly enough, but as he reached the fused claws, he broke one hacksaw blade and then another. Grunkle Stan wandered out, covered with blue bandages and a blinking light attached to his bare shoulder, his tuxedo coat sitting somewhere inside. He gave the other three a thumbs-up, and got three wide smiles in return.

Finally, Grunkle Ford sat back, throwing his hands up in defeat. “Kids, I haven’t even  _scratched_  that stuff.” He peered at the fused claws in annoyance, muttering “Barring a thermo-fusion cutting laser, I’m not sure you could get those off. Must have been some sort of alloy metamorphosis, to make sure the Recruiter’s victim couldn’t escape or something.”

He looked worried, but Dipper and Mabel just grinned at each other and shrugged. The fused claws now just looked like featureless faceted metal bracelets, slightly thicker on one side but not overly intrusive; The rest of the monster had been pulled apart and off of them and their wrists.

Stanford nodded, apologetic he couldn’t fully remove the claws but glad at least that the Twins didn’t seem to mind there were some leftovers. He stood up and sat on the couch next to Stanley, graciously accepting the Pitt his brother offered and sighed with satisfaction.

Mabel noticed something, and darted forward to the newly-destoned totem pole; In a pile of ash near its base, she brushed aside some dirt and debris to reveal a little purple flower at the end of a small fist-sized green plant. She reached for it, letting out a triumphant whoop, and then ran back to her brother.

Dipper looked baffled as she held a pair of fingers under his nose, but then he broke into a chuckling grin; It smelled of mint, and he laughed. The fresh smell cut through the smell of ash, and he leaned back, interlacing his fingers through his sister’s as their bracelets clinked together.

_I love you, Mabes._

_Love you too, Dip._

They let out a mutual sigh of contentment, and leaned back on the porch, watching as the morning sunlight cut through the clouds, illuminating the town of Gravity Falls laid out before them.

 

The trees rustled, hissing as a wind rustled through them, carrying away the lingering odor of the fires, and replacing it with the smell of the forest’s pines.

 

 

**FIN.**


End file.
